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A brilliant Dutch novel that explores the connections to the disconnected. The Twin By Gerbrand Bakker Translated from the Dutch by David Colmer. Archipelago Books, 343 pages. Reviewed by Tommy Wallach It isn’t easy to write a compelling novel about loneliness, for the simple reason that loneliness is boring. It makes for something of a…
Read MoreIs it more harmful for a museum item to be crated and shipped off to a loan exhibition or left hanging in its own gallery or storage facility? Do we see the scars of damage once they have been repaired? Ronni Baer in the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, December 2007 By Gary Schwartz “I’m…
Read MoreCharlotte Roche is one of the most famous authors in Germany. Thomas Mann must be spinning in his grave. Wetlands By Charlotte Roche. Translated from the German by Tim Mohr. Grove Press, 240 pages. By Tommy Wallach On the subject of literary criticism, Martin Amis has written that “quotation is the reviewer’s only hard evidence.”…
Read MoreAn assured novel that celebrates, with considerable stylistic facility, an extraordinary engagement with the history of literature. Rex by Jose Manuel Prieto Translated from Spanish by Esther Allen. Grove Press, 288 pages Reviewed by Alexander Nemser Jose Manuel Prieto’s “Rex” is an adventure through time: not historical time, or physical time, so much as literary…
Read MoreBy Harvey Blume Bernie Madoff and his Ponzi scheme have become symbols of fraud, greed and dull-witted naiveté, of lax oversight, slobbering credulity, and rank criminality — the whole slew of failings and circumstances that have beggared Wall St. and deflated the global economy. Damien Hirst is less known. He’s no billionaire swindler, merely a…
Read MoreBrazilian writer Nelson Rodrigues — a master at evoking the humor and pathos of out-of-control libidos. Life As It Is: Selected Stories By Nelson Rodrigues. Translated from the Portuguese by Alex Ladd. Host Publications, 314 pages Reviewed by Bill Marx No nonsense British philosopher Thomas Hobbes famously described man’s life as it is as “solitary,…
Read MoreCommedia dell’arte performers doing their thing in the HTC world premiere production of “The Miracle at Naples.” The Miracle at Naples, a new comedy by David Grimm. Directed by Peter DuBois. Presented by the Huntington Theatre Company at the Stanford Calderwood Pavilion at the Boston Center for the Arts, through May 9, 2009. Reviewed by…
Read MoreThe handsomely produced bilingual volume reflects a committed and passionate marriage of an exacting poet-translator and Yiddish poetry. With Everything We’ve Got: A Personal Anthology of Yiddish Poetry Edited and translated by Richard J. Fein. Host Publications, 218 pages. Reviewed by Anna Razumnaya Fortuitously, just before the publication of Richard Fein’s new anthology With Everything…
Read MoreTwo French writers take on the notion of would-be writers on the run. Only one gets away with it. Julien Parme By Florian Zeller Translated from the French by Christopher Moncrieff. Pushkin Press, 246 pages. Tokyo Fiancee by Amélie Northomb Translated from the French by Alison Anderson. Europa Editions, 152 pages. Reviewed by Tommy Wallach…
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